


if only to hope that time stand still

by TataniSky



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, And Shitty Puns, Angst, Crack, F/M, Female Protagonist, Fluff, Here There Be Nerds, Multi, Retelling
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-15
Updated: 2015-11-01
Packaged: 2018-04-26 12:55:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5005600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TataniSky/pseuds/TataniSky
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Of all the weird shit that's happened to you, falling into a mountain and coming face-to-face with history book myths is probably number one on the list. Honestly, you're not quite sure if you should be grateful or if you should run screaming. [Hiatus]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Alice Should Have Skinned The Rabbit

**Author's Note:**

> I am complete and utter garbage. Just throw me into the dumpster with the rest of the fandom.
> 
> It's been at least five years since I last wrote fanfiction and it's freaking skeletons and awesome music that make me start up again. Bear with me guys, I have no idea what the fuck I'm doing.

_Drip. Drip. Drip. _

The noise beat a steady rhythm that slowly roused you back into the waking world, eyes squinted open and for an impossibly long moment you thought you were dead. Far, far above you was a tiny pinprick of watery grey light; you stared at it blankly, the constant dripping drowned out by a sudden ringing in your ears. A droplet struck your cheek, unpleasantly cold, and you flinched reflexively; all at once, your entire back body began to throb with pain and you groaned, coming to the conclusion that you were - unfortunately - not dead.

You scrunched your eyes shut and pressed the heels of your hands against them, making the effort to recover your wits and attempting to recall what had happened. Your brain was reluctant at first, but slowly began to offer snippets of clarity.

Apparently, you had pulled an Alice and had fallen down the rabbit hole.

Groaning again, you carefully rolled onto your side and sat upright; the entire back of your body hurt, but your fingers and toes wiggled normally and you could remember who you were, so you figured you'd live. Which was pretty amazing, honestly, since the hole you'd fallen down was a long way up. 

"How am I not dead?" you wondered aloud, taking a moment to properly look at where you'd ended up. For whatever strange reason, you'd landed on a lone patch of yellow flowers in an otherwise empty cavern. That was definitely weird, though what was even more puzzling was the fact that the mountain was apparently hollow. How did that work?

Carefully, you climbed to your feet, shivering as your hands brushed against the petals of the out-of-place flowers. For a moment it felt as if something sinister brushed against you. You shook your head, feeling a little foolish, but quickly stepped out of the flower patch anyway. You wondered why your heart was racing; they were only flowers, right? 

"I need to get out of here," you decided outloud, sweeping your eyes across the room. There was an elaborate doorway on the far side and you briefly wondered if there were people living down here, or who had lived down here. Either way, you were glad that there was a way out at all; dying of starvation because you'd stupidly trapped yourself down a hole would be a sucky way to die.

You quickly exited the room, only to come face-to-face with another flower. Literally, the flower had a face. Maybe you really were dead? This was a strange sort of hell to be in, though. You stared at the flower, dumbfounded, and it stared back. A fleeting, but queer expression flashed across its face - as if it too was taken aback - but it was gone before you could process it.

"Howdy! I'm Flowey the flower," it said eventually, and you felt in need of a table to flip, because this had to be some sort of fever dream, or an acid trip. It was too weird to be death, you thought a little hysterically. Even Hell had standards, right? 

Surely even Alice would be confused by this nonsense. Thusly, you came to a very swift decision. 

"Nope," you uttered vehemently.

The flower wobbled in place, looking thrown by the sudden turn in events. "What?" it asked.

"Nope.Nope.Nope," you repeated, spying another doorway behind the flower and quickly making like a tree, quitting the room.

"H-hey! Wait!" Flowey the flower tried again, swiveling to watch your speedy retreat. Its expression was quickly morphing from surprise to anger and your spidey senses were literally screaming at you. This was definitely bad news bears, man.

"We don't want any, kaythanksbye," your power walk turned into a dash, reaching the door just as the flower's face distorted into something malicious and full of rage.

"Come back here! Stupid human, running won't save you! I'm going to kill you!" the flower screamed, its previously high-pitched voice warping into something hellish and crazed.

You channeled your inner Speedy Gonzalez and booked it through to the next room just as the one with the flower began to tremble.

"Holy shiiiiit~!" you almost flew down the next hallway, kicking up and jumping over random piles of orange leaves, not trusting that they too wouldn't sprout consciousness and begin attacking you. The next room had a double staircase and you took them three at a time, almost tripping over the last step and careening into a wall. Past the stairs was a closed door and that's what finally stopped you.

Your heart was pounding against your ribs at lightspeed, lungs on fire, and your entire body was trembling, arms and legs feeling like wet noodles as you started to crash from the adrenaline high. You bent over and heaved for breath, the back of your tongue tasted like an old penny, and you shakily hobbled your way to the nearest wall, using it to support yourself.

"What the actual fuck," you wheezed, licking your dry lips, and taking a deep breath to encourage your heart to calm down. It took a hot minute, but eventually you managed to pull yourself together enough to stop freaking out. Flowers were now officially ruined for you.

Pushing shaking fingers through your hair to get it out of your face, you took in your new surroundings. There were several buttons on the floor and a switch on the wall near the door. Trying the door only confirmed that it was locked.

Was it some sort of puzzle? You eyed the buttons on the floor balefully. Who the hell thought it was a good idea to make problem solving the key to a door? What happened to good old locks and keys?

Before you could really work yourself up into a gold-medal tantrum, a mechanical groan came from the  other side of said door and slowly it started to open. Warily, you took a step back; there was no where to hide and you definitely weren't going back to the flower room, so you were pretty much screwed if the person on the other side was another weirdo.

The door opened fully and in stepped a bipedal goat-woman in a dress. You felt your common sense scream as it flew off the planet and burned in the sun. You were so done.

"Oh, dear," the goat-woman murmured, blinking at you with wide, brown eyes, her hand still poised on the door where she'd stilled upon seeing you.

She collected herself much more quickly than you, standing a little taller and looking oddly graceful and kind. "Hello. Welcome to the Underground, my name is Toriel," she greeted you warmly, but all you could do was stare mutely.  This new variable didn't seem like a threat, and you really hoped that she wasn't; you were crashing hard, and you didn't think you'd be able to make another run for it, not when she was blocking the door and the only other route would be back toward the murderous flower. 

She frowned and seemed to notice your disheveled state and wan complexion.  Your hands were scraped and bruised, your hair was a mess, and your clothes were full of dirt; all you really wanted to do was take a scalding hot shower and self-medicate with some greasy, unhealthy food. 

"My child," she said gently, and you braced yourself against the oddly soothing tones of her voice. You wouldn't allow yourself to be misled, though it was hard to focus when your mind was reeling in the face of all these new impossibilities. Toriel paused and thought better of asking if you were alright, because it was pretty obvious you weren't.

"Come with me, we'll get you cleaned up," she gestured back the way she came with her shoulder and a warm smile.

You blinked, blankly staring through her for a moment and considering your options. Honestly, you didn't have many. It was either follow this strange creature or not follow her and risk incurring her possible anger. A little unsteadily, you took a step forward.

Fuzzy memories about your long ago high school education began to float forward. History lessons you'd mostly slept through about a time when monsters and humans coexisted on the surface until war broke out and the monsters were banished. It had all seemed so romantic and far-removed back then, like your teacher had been lecturing a fairy tail instead of facts.  Obviously you never thought any of that information had been relevant to you. You'd been wrong, apparently. 

You still weren't entirely certain you weren't just tripping balls right now, but as the last of the adrenaline left your system and your entire body started to ache, you were slowly coming to accept that this was all too terribly real. You were completely sober and had somehow ended up falling into your own version of Wonderland. 

Well, fuck.

You hoped, at the very least, that there was a sexy mad hatter down here. You were going to need  _something_ to help you cope with all this weirdness.


	2. No Soul Gazing Here, My Window's Cracked

Nothing made sense anymore.

Feeling very much like a lost, dumb, little lamb, you followed behind Toriel as she lead you through a maze of paths and puzzles, explaining cheerily that this was normal procedure down here; the puzzles were meant to keep humans out. You're not quite sure why she was leading you through them then, considering you're one hundred percent human, but you didn't get the feeling that she was secretly plotting to bake you into a pie so you kept following her.

Eventually, she paused in a tiny room with a stuffed dummy and turned to you with a smile. "As a human in the Underground," she began, "monsters may attack you."

The look you gave her clearly read as  _'really? no, shit... I wouldn't have guessed.'_ She frowned at your sarcastic brainwave but remained undeterred. You hadn't told her about the murderous flower, so you supposed she must have thought you were a little soft in the head, wandering around monster-land looking like you'd been in a fight with a bear and lost. 

"You'll need to be prepared," she continued on, assuring you that the process was easy. "When monsters approach, you'll be drawn into a FIGHT." you're not sure why there was a weird emphasis on that word, "Don't worry though, all you have to do is have a nice conversation with them and I'll come over to help you."

What?

"You... want me to converse with something that's trying to kill me?"  

Yeah, sure. Why the fuck not? Makes about as much sense as everything else down here.

She didn't seem to appreciate your tone.

Pointedly, she gestured to the dummy and told you to approach it for a demonstration. Skepticism rising, you reluctantly complied. You came within a foot of the prop when suddenly more crazy shit started to happen. You stumbled, feeling oddly woozy, and there was a noise like rushing water, or like the hiss of a zipper. Disoriented, you tried throwing your hands out to hold onto something, but the effort it took was gargantuan, like wading through syrup. You were pretty sure your heart was racing, but it felt more like a phantom sensation, happening from a distance. You felt... disconnected, somehow. Like you were spread too thin, or like there was too much of you, but not enough.

When you finally managed to focus, eyes on your hands, you noticed with distant alarm that you were very much see-through. And when you moved, your outline lingered, wispy and shimmering like a heatwave. Distantly, you could hear Toriel's voice. She sounded perfectly calm, as if nothing were wrong and you had the vague feeling of wanting to strangle her, because this was way far from normal.

When you turned your head to look at her, you had to stop and stare. There was another you standing behind you, completely motionless with unfocused eyes, towering like a giant. As you stared at yourself, you became gradually aware that Toriel's voice was getting clearer, that there was a buzzing in your ears and that sensation was bleeding back.

"...this is your SOUL," Toriel explained, prompting you to rip your eyes away from what was, apparently, your body. The loss of focus wiped away the returning feelings, leaving you disconnected again, and you realized that you'd just tapped into your physical body for a moment. Why was your soul outside of your body? That was some strange, voodoo magic bullshit and you were  _not_ happy about it.

 _Talk with the dummy,_ you remembered, and when you turned to look at it you found that it hadn't changed at all. Its button eyes were looking at you and you were struck with the feeling that this thing also had a soul of some sort, one that remained in its body like it was supposed to. Why was that?

You had a vague, niggling recollection of your history teacher droning on about monsters being made of magic instead of flesh and bone. So maybe magic  _was_ their soul? So what were human souls made of? This was getting way too existential for you.

"Uhm... hello?" you finally tried, a little perturbed by how strange your voice sounded. The dummy remained motionless, but something about the pressure in the air changed and when you blinked, you found yourself back inside your body.

A little frantically, you felt yourself up, blinking hard and panting, heart stuttering in your chest. "Holy shit," you breathed, locking wide eyes onto Toriel who was looking at you with great concern.

You really, really hoped that you wouldn't have to do that again.

"You did well," Toriel offerd gently, seeming to realize that she probably should have explained what would happen before throwing you to the wolves. You didn't reply. Carefully, she reached out to squeeze your arm, then continued to lead the way.

By the time you made it to her house, you had several more encounters with the colorful denizens of the Underground: frogs, droopy handkerchief fairies, and depressed ghosts included. Having your soul separated from your body didn't stop being weird and uncomfortable, but after the fourth time you stopped freaking out about it. You did have to wonder why these creatures were bombarding you with attacks if they supposedly meant you no harm, however. You also wondered why your life has turned into a video game.

You didn't even know why you _bothered_ to wonder; the answers weren't going to make sense, anyway.

Toriel's house was quaint and cute, if a bit lonely. She seemed to live alone and from what you'd gleaned from a brief conversation with a Froggit, the residents of the Ruins were intimidated by her. 

"It's nice having someone around," Toriel said a little sadly, showing you to a spare bedroom before rushing off to save the pie she had in the oven from burning. It smelled freaking heavenly, the house smelled like cinnamon and sugar. Since she'd said it was for you, you definitely wouldn't have any qualms about eating the whole thing. You could really go for some comfort food.

You poked around her house for a bit and looked through all her knickknacks and bookshelves. Her house was full of cattails and the odd yellow flower - of which you eyeballed mistrustfully - but overall your original idea that she was lonely was reinforced. Eventually, you entered your borrowed bedroom and looked around in there, too. Disturbingly, there was a pile of toys near the bed and a box of mismatched children's shoes in the corner. 

"I  _really_ hope there aren't any children in that pie," you commented, taking a seat on the bed. You didn't realize how tired you were until you rested your head on the pillow and fell asleep almost immediately. 

When you woke up sometime later, you felt almost like a person again. The nap had done wonders for your temperament and though you still felt understandably overwhelmed by everything that had happened so far, you found yourself feeling a little more open-minded about it all.

You felt a little unsure about the slice of pie Toriel had left in the room, but hunger proved too persuasive to stop you. You couldn't confirm that there were children in the pie, therefore it was safe to eat. Logic. Plus, Toriel made a mean cinnamon-butterscotch pie.

Rested and fed, you began to feel a little more optimistic about life. After all, monsters had only been creatures out of a textbook to you just that morning. Sure things were bat shit crazy down here in the Underground, but you found your curiosity piqued. You'd always been too curious for your own good.

Grabbing your empty plate, you exited the room and went in search of Toriel, your mind full of burning questions. Well, she _had_ said she'd always wanted to be a teacher and you were very interested in learning all about this strange, new world you'd fallen into.  

 

 


	3. A Beginning To All Things

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Right, sorry for the wait. I'd like to say I had a good excuse for it, but really I'm just lazy. This is unbeta'd, by the way, so please excuse the tense changes and the grammar. 
> 
> By the way, if you have suggestions for anything you'd like to see in the story, go ahead and leave a comment. I can't guarantee that I'll be able to work it in, but since I don't have a set story line I'll try my best. 
> 
> Thank you for all the comments and kudos! You guys are the best. <3

The RUINS were tiny, you quickly discovered. You had already walked them dozens of times in the short while you'd been there, becoming better acquainted with the various monsters who dwelt in the Underground. They kept attacking you for whatever reason, even if they never actually tried to hit you anymore. They also kept giving you gold. It was really fucking odd, but you weren't going to complain; you usually spent your small fortune buying spider donuts.

For real, though. Those things were delicious. They also came in handy when your host tried to serve you snail pie. Toriel was cool people, but her sense of taste was sometimes lacking; probably because she was a goat. Goats were mini garbage disposals, right?

Still, it'd been almost a week since you fell into the Underground and cabin fever had slowly, but surely started to settle in. Life seemed to move very sedately down here and while it was definitely a novel change of pace, this was the longest you'd stayed in any one place _ever_  and it left you feeling very off-kilter. You weren't used to people enjoying your company, let alone enjoying theirs in return.

Toriel was very good at keeping her inner thoughts and feelings to herself, but you were an old hand at sussing out people's emotions; your host was lonely and had been for a while now. In the short while you'd been staying with her, you'd learned quite a bit about Toriel and her fellow monsters. Admittedly, she was very good at skirting around deeper issues, but she occasionally let on more than she probably realized.

For instance, the way she held herself, full of purpose and grace, and the way she spoke, steel beneath kindness, informed you that she'd been well off at one point. High-class breeding and all of that. She also possessed certain mannerisms and tics, such as insistently feeding you, brushing aside your hair, gently correcting your posture or your grammar, that told you she'd been a mother.

Past tense, because sometimes Toriel would stop and gaze into the distance, unfocused, a weighty sadness settling over her shoulders like a cloak.

You felt for her, you really did, but sometimes her attentions became overbearing. Maybe a few years ago you would have been more receptive to having a proper maternal figure in your life, but you were definitely much too jaded for that now.

It was especially grating that she wouldn't let you leave. You knew there had to be more to the Underground than these ruins, and you also knew that the way forward was through that ominous door at the bottom of those incongruous stairs in the foyer. However, every time you brought up the subject, a shadow would pass over Toriel's face and she would hastily skirt around the topic, her smile strained at the edges.

You were beginning to feel caged and anxious.

So it was one morning, on the eighth day of you staying there, when Toriel had gone to make her usual rounds through the RUINS, that you decided to take matters into your own hands. 

You ventured down the stairs and followed the ridiculously long hallway, eventually coming upon the suspect doors. In front of them you paused, eyes narrowed as you tried to work out how to open them.

There weren't any puzzles to solve and the doors had no knobs or handles. You approached them a little warily, pressing a palm to the smooth surface and taking note that they were warm to the touch.

"It's gonna suck if I need magic to open this bad boy," you muttered to yourself.

Sudden, heavy knocking nearly made you jump free of your skin. You startled like a cat, nearly tripping over your feet as you scrambled away, choking on an aborted yelp. Heart hammering against your ribs, you eyed the door distrustfully, not one hundred percent sure the damn thing wouldn't decide to transform into some weird, piranha-dragon hybrid or somesuch and eat you.

Another knock sounded.

You waited for a beat, but nothing more happened.

Feeling both vexed and foolish, you ultimately decided that the best course of action was to, of course, knock back. Because, why the fuck not? You crept forward and crouched next to the doors, rapping your knuckles against them and straining to hear if anything moved on the other side. Man, you'd kill for a peephole right now.

From the other side came a low-pitched voice.

"Did you hear the one about the guy who got hit in the head with a can of soda? He's lucky it was a SOFT drink."

"…"

What.The.Fuck?

No, but really. What?

You snorted and the laughter that bubbled forth was entirely out of your control and maybe just a tad bit hysterical. The joke wasn't even funny, it was so bad it hurt, actually. But you'd pretty quickly discovered during your time here that Toriel enjoyed bad puns and now you were crouched in front of a door, in a lost-to-history, underground, monster society, finding that monsters probably had a horrible sense of humor and that goat mom probably spent an inordinate amount of time in front of this door, trading bad jokes with whoever this stranger was.

You weren't even sure why you were laughing, but you were having a hell of a hard time stopping. You were pretty sure you'd finally lost your marbles.

Laughter seemed to be what the stranger was hoping for, however, because he rattled off another one, then another one. By now, you'd crumpled to the floor, wheezing, abs on fire from how hard you were laughing. Seriously, what had your life become?

"You okay back there, pal?" the voice asked, sounding horribly amused.

No, you wanted to tell him; you were pretty sure you were suffering a psychotic break. You struggled to compose yourself, wiping tears from your eyes and taking a moment to breathe.

"I'm good," you said instead and there was a palpable pause from the other side.

"You're not who I usually talk to...." he pointed out and there was an odd note to his voice now.

Oops. Seemed you gave yourself away.

"No, she's not here," you told him and you weren't sure how you could tell, but the silence on the other side of the door was suddenly chilling.

"Not there?" he asked with forced casualness and you paused, wondering about this sudden change in attitude.

Carefully, you pulled back to eye the door with a growing sense of trepidation. You hoped this person wasn't secretly another Flowey. That would be terribly unfortunate.

"She's out, walking the ruins," you shifted nervously, "she'll be back soon."

More silence, but the tension in the air was slowly dissolving and you exhaled the breath you didn't know you were holding.

"Well, nice to know there's someone else who can appreciate a pun, pal," he said and you wondered what the hell just happened. You'd been finding yourself wondering that a lot, lately.

You also found yourself wondering if you should continue on with your plan now that there was a possible psycho on the other side of the door. You considered your options for exactly five seconds, then decided it was probably worth the risk.

"Hey," you called out, weight shifted onto the balls of your feet, still crouched before the doors.

"You wouldn't happen to know how to open these doors, would you?"

He took a while to answer and you began to wonder if he was even there anymore, brows furrowed as you tried to pick up any noise from the other side. You began to grow restless; you'd spent more time down here than you'd planned. Toriel wouldn't be gone for much longer and you really didn't know how she'd react if she caught you down here.

If she flipped her shit, you wanted to be very far away. Call you a coward, but you hadn't survived this long by being earnest.

"Have you tried, uh, pushing them?" his voice floated over at last, pulling you from your thoughts.

Pushing them? No way it would be that easy.

Still, you stood up and regarded the doors with narrowed eyes. They seemed heavy, like they would definitely need more than your own meager strength to push open. But your curiosity was burning, and there was an entire world on the other side of those doors; you were filled with determination.

"Here goes nothing," you planted your palms against the doors, pressed against them solidly and pushed.

The doors were stubborn and resisted; it was weird, but you could almost feel the magic inside of them that was keeping them closed. The magic clashed with your will, thinning and weakening, until it snapped like a thread and suddenly the doors parted easily and soundlessly.

You stumbled forward, caught off guard, and even more perplexed when a gust of cold wind hit you straight in the face. Beyond the door was, amazingly, a snow covered forest; tall, black trees lined either side of a narrow path that disappeared into the distance.

Also, there was a short skeleton in a hoodie and house slippers.

You caught the tail-end of alarmed surprise on his features - and how did that work? - before they smoothed over into something decidedly practiced and neutral. Non-threatening, and made to be easily overlooked.

You had a feeling that you and this skeleton probably had a lot in common.

"Guess it was pretty easy, then?" he asked, then offered a bony hand to shake.

You eyed him a moment, before obligingly you reached out to grasp it. A loud farting noise broke the stillness of the forest and your new acquaintance winked at you. "The old whoopee cushion in the hand trick..."

The odd tension between you two disappeared in an instant and you had an inkling that you were going to like this person, bad puns and obvious mysteries included. Helplessly, you began to giggle, squeezing his hand just a little tighter to finish the handshake.

The edges of his grin softened and became more genuine, though you'd hardly noticed.

"Welcome to the Underground, kid."


	4. Chicken Noodle Soup

_Shh, be very, very quiet; I'm hunting wabbits!_

Elmer Fudd's comical voice sounded through your head as you watched, bemused and helplessly endeared, the taller of the two skeleton brothers speed walk away, his curious _Nyehehe_ laughter marking his exit. Papyrus was a loon, but he was so fucking adorable that you'd probably forgive him murder. Actually, you'd probably commit the murder for him, because he was simply too precious for life.

Seriously though, the Underground must have cast some weird juju on you, because ever since you'd fallen down that hole you'd been acting very out of character. Or maybe you were going soft in your old age? Either way, you should have probably been more concerned that it had taken all of five minutes for that enthusiastic skeleton to worm his way beneath your skin.

Especially since said skeleton's goal was to capture you and present you to the head of the royal guard, who probably wasn't as lighthearted as Papyrus.

"Thanks for playing along, bud. I haven't seen him this happy in a while," Sans' voice broke you from your thoughts, and he shuffled up to you slowly, his house-slippers silent on the hard snow.

You offered him an easy smile, "… well, I'm not going to lie and say I'm not having fun, too."

He scrutinized you for a moment - you've noticed that he did that quite a lot, much to your discomfort - the odd pinpricks of light that served as his eyes strangely intense. You weren't really sure what he was looking for, or what he expected you to do, but you got the feeling that he found you to be an unexpected surprise - whether a good or a bad one, you didn't know.

Eventually, his gaze slid off to the side, as it usually did, "That's good to know."

Your brows furrowed, but it didn't look like he was going to offer any more insight on his strange personality. You'd realized that the two brothers were pretty much opposites of each other; where Papyrus was transparent, Sans was a walking enigma. He was really hard to get a read on and that was disturbing to you, because figuring out how people ticked was a skill you'd worked hard to perfect.

Without another word, you followed after Papyrus, figuring he'd had enough time to set up his next puzzle. When you briefly turned back around to see if Sans was watching, you felt a chill when you realized he was no longer there.

Teleporting seemed to be a thing he could do, but it was really fucking creepy when he was there one moment and not the next. Also, how unfair was it that monsters had all these cool powers? You wanted the power of teleportation! The levels of laziness you'd be able to accomplish would be unreal.

You kept walking.

Soon enough, after several more puzzles and a very disturbing encounter with a dog whose neck kept growing the more you pet him - also, why so many dogs? - you came upon a small town that was ironically called Snowdin.

"They _would_ live in such a place," you said aloud, shaking your head as you ventured further in.

You knew Papyrus was waiting for you, but you allowed your curiosity to sweep you along; you entered a small shop as you passed by to see what kind of trinkets monsters had in stock. The shopkeeper was a rather laidback bunny-woman who swept her eyes over you, but otherwise seemed unphased by having a human in her shop.

"Another one, huh?" she whispered so softly you almost missed it, then continued on before you could really register what you'd heard, welcoming you to her shop and inviting you to take a gander at her wares.

Distracted, you were lured into small-talk with the rabbit and ended up getting a discount for a warm jacket, which you definitely needed because you had not dressed for the winter when you'd climbed that mountain.

Back outside, you stood dazed for a moment, mechanically shrugging on your new purchase and just breathing, your breath creating small clouds in the cold. So there had been other humans down here. You wondered what happened to them, because certainly someone who had run across monsters would have spread the word about them up top.

Unless...

Well, you didn't really want to think about the 'unless.'

You shoved your hands into your pockets, gathered your bearings and strode on. The few townsfolk who stopped you to chat, intrigued by the newcomer, didn't mention anything about humans and you didn't think it was a good idea to bring it up. It didn't seem like any other monster besides the shopkeep actually recognized you as human; that was probably a good thing, you felt.

Meeting up with Papyrus again made you feel better, even if he ended up challenging you and once again you were disembodied.

You blinked away the disorientation, moved your phantom fingers and took in your latest opponent. Papyrus stood across from you, his stance weirdly sassy and his grin wide and excited, practically vibrating with enthusiasm. He'd given you a speech before starting this whole thing that made you believe the poor guy was lonely, that he wanted to be friends. Of course, he'd worded it so it seemed like this was all your idea.

You started to suspect that loneliness was a trend down here.

Feeling mischievous, you smiled at him playfully and decided that since you were obviously not going to _hurt_ him, that you would tease him instead. It was weird, but he had great bone structure - no pun intended - and while finding a skeleton attractive was pretty fucking bizarre, you weren't going to deny that it was true.

So you told him he's cute and the poor guy went all squinty and shifty eyed, like he wasn't sure what was happening.

"What?!" he stuttered, "Fl-flirting?! So you finally reveal your ultimate feelings!"

You had to bite the inside of your cheek to keep from laughing, though the smile was fighting pretty hard to spread across your face.

"W-well! I'm a skeleton with very high standards!" he announced, fidgeting and looking at you askance, as if challenging you to meet them.

"Papyrus," you practically purred, feeling dangerously intrigued when a flush rose on his cheekbones, "I know how to make a killer spaghetti."

"I," he floundered, eye sockets widening and face burning, looking nervous enough to bolt like a frightened fawn, "y-you... you're meeting all my s-standards..."

He shifted his weight nervously and you watched him squirm with rapt attention. Perhaps you were having too much fun with this? The guy seemed to be completely out of his depth and you were starting to feel a little bad for teasing him like this.

But then Papyrus seemed to rally and he straightened back into his sassy pose, though his face was still flushed and he was having trouble meeting your eyes.

"I g-guess this means I have to go on a date with you?" he queried, completely unsure. Precious baby.

"L-let's date later! After I capture you..."

Deciding to have mercy, all you did was smile in return and then the battle began in earnest. Fighting Papyrus was interesting, because you didn't really want to attack him, but he was definitely on a different level than all the other monsters you'd faced so far. You weren't even sure why you'd taken Toriel's words to heart - it wasn't as if you could actually hurt these people, not when they had magic and you only had yourself. They had you at a serious disadvantage, right? But every time you considered throwing an actual punch, an uneasy feeling settled heavily in the pit of your stomach.

You kind of just _knew_ that that somehow wasn't the case and you didn't want to test the theory to see if you were right.

So you were stuck being attacked and unable to properly defend yourself, even when their hits sometimes connected and _hurt_.

"Hey, Papyrus," you said after several rounds of dodging his attacks, taking a breather now that it was your turn.

The tall skeleton had regained his mojo now that you weren't teasing him and was bouncing in place, doing a little dance, really into the 'fight.'

"There is no need to say anything, human!" he crowed happily, "I, the Great Papyrus, can see how impressed you are by my skill!"

You couldn't help but smile at him. "Very impressed," you agreed, both because it was true and to make him happy. His pleased _nyeh heh heh_ was somehow extremely satisfying.

"… but, y'know... I really would like to be your friend," you continued honestly and he paused, regarding you with hopeful surprise.

"R-Really?!" he asked, wide-eyed. You wanted to hug him. Who wouldn't want to be friends with this guy? He was impossibly sweet and so very forthright; even your prickly personality was melted by his charms.

"Wowie," he seemed overjoyed, but quickly seemed to realize he was being too open about it and regained his bluster.

"I mean... Of course you do! Who wouldn't want to be the Great Papyrus' friend?" he chuckled. "Suffer no more, human! I will accept your offer! Nyeh heh heh~"

Slowly, you filtered back into your body once Papyrus dropped the battle and you blinked your head clear as everything realigned.

"We must celebrate our new, awesome friendship!" he declared, seeming incredibly pleased with himself.

"I, as a master spaghettore, will, of course, cook you the best spaghetti yet! Come, human!" he charged away and you scrambled to follow as he lead you back into town and toward the large house that you'd previously assumed was theirs from the mailboxes.

He threw the front door open, laughing all the while, and made a beeline straight for the kitchen, telling you to make yourself at home. Carefully, you closed the house door and tried your best not to track melted snow inside with you.

Now that there was a moment of peace, you realized that you were starving; your stomach growled on cue. You hadn't eaten anything since you'd left Toriel's house and who knew how long ago that was? There wasn't a way to track time down here, but you figured it'd been several hours, at least.

You stood in the middle of the living room for a moment, peering at everything you could from your vantage point, tempted to snoop since you'd been given leave to do so. But the dubious sounds coming from the kitchen drew you away and you wandered into the kitchen to see what chaos your new skeleton friend was causing.

It was like watching interpretive dancing. Or two trains colliding. Whatever it was that he thought he was doing, it wasn't cooking.

Morbidly fascinated, you parked yourself in a corner and just watched the destruction happen. He wiggled and hummed a tune as he putzed about, wearing a cute apron and practically beaming.

"I hope you are hungry, human!" he said, putting a serious amount of elbow grease into stirring the poor pot of noodles.

"And, afterwards, we may have our date if you would like?" he questioned, brow bones furrowed as he thought about that, rubbing his chin, "… though, the Great Papyrus thinks he may have already been friend zoned."

You laughed.

Sans popped in out of nowhere ten minutes later, once Papyrus had put the finishing touches on his 'best pasta yet.' You side-eyed the short skeleton; again, he seemed surprised to see you.

"You're still here," he commented oddly and you wondered if you should be offended by that.

"Should I not be?" You asked and he shrugged, looking aside for a moment, before meeting your gaze again.

"Stay as long as you like," he said mildly and with a weird touch of irony.

"Sans, you've made it just in time!" Papyrus interrupted, dishing out hearty servings of pasta for the both of you, handing you yours first. Sans took his reluctantly, though the smile on his face never wavered.

You seemed to recall the frozen spaghetti you never got to taste and Sans alluding to his brother's poor cooking skills. After watching his dubious technique, you really hoped you wouldn't die from eating spaghetti.

You could feel Sans watching you as you tried to subtly sniff your plate, his amusement practically radiated off of him. Barely resisting the urge to stick your tongue out at him childishly, you grabbed a fork and bit the bullet, taking your first taste.

Unsurprisingly, it didn't really taste or feel like pasta anymore. But it wasn't... _horrible_. Certainly you'd eaten worse things than salty, overcooked pasta. And if there was some cardboard in there from the box, well... it added fiber, right?

Unphased, because you were a badass, you continued eating your meal like nothing was amiss, giving a thumbs up to Papyrus who waited eagerly on the sidelines. Sans looked at you as if you'd grown another head, but you ignored him and his sass.

And you even had seconds, your tastebuds be damned.


	5. The Meaning of Dreams

Night in the Underground was overwhelmingly dark.

You sat on your rented bed in the nearby inn with a blanket around your shoulders and your knees drawn to your chest. In the next room over, there was an entire family tucked away, lost to their dreams and snoring loudly. You found the disturbance to be more comforting than annoying; it added life to this strange place you’d found yourself in. Not like the ruins; back there, despite the comfortable bed, the stillness and the silence had made you feel as if you’d been sleeping in a crypt.

But even now, outside of them, you found that sleep still eluded you. You stared at the far wall and counted your breaths - _in… out… in… out…_ \- wondering why your mind was racing and why your pulse wouldn’t slow down. You were tense as a bowstring, fingers curled tight to keep them from trembling, and teeth chattering from anxiety with every inhale.

Something was _wrong_. You just didn’t know what; nothing was moving, the streets outside were dark and quiet.

Silently, you crawled free of the blankets, still fully dressed from the day, and slowly crept your way out of the room and down the stairs. The lobby was empty, the proprietress and her son also lost to their warm beds and sweet dreams. You exited the inn.

The streets were empty and the magical lamps were dim, bathing the snowy ground with an ominous half-light. It was colder than it had been during the daylight hours, but you were so wired that you barely noticed it, the adrenaline thick as syrup in your veins.

For a moment you waffled in front of the inn, unsure whether to go left or right. Truthfully, though it rankled you to admit it, you’d like nothing more than to run back to the ruins and to Toriel’s warm, kind smiles. Unfortunately, as you’d quickly discovered when you’d left them in the first place, that door only opened from the inside.

At first, you’d tried banging on it, hoping that Toriel would hear you and let you back inside. If she had heard, she’d ignored you, probably stung by your betrayal, and you’d remained stuck on this side.

You chose left, away from the path that would lead you back to that lonely, hidden door.

It took you longer than it should have for you to recognize what that foreboding feeling was. You were being watched. Your heart flip-flopped in your chest and you looked up, eyes roving side-to-side without moving your head; every shadow became an enemy.

Something dark flit past your peripheral and you stopped in place, so tense you were practically vibrating. When you turned your head to look, nothing was there. Nothing else moved. You were at the cross-section of the town now; forward was the skeleton brothers’ home and up lead to the river and the weird, ice-cube conveyor belt.

A ringing began in your ears, high-pitched like the screaming of a tea kettle. It sounded like laughter, shrill and mocking and cruel. _Familiar_.

“You alright, pal?”

You were too scared to scream, turning around so quickly that your head spun, stomach roiling with nauseous fear. Sans was standing behind you. How he got there, you didn’t know, because his house had been in front of you and no one had walked past.

You were having trouble focusing on him, the ringing in your head was getting louder, turning into a rushing roar and you felt that there was a very real risk of you vomitting all over the snow. Sans didn't look right. His grin was too wide, his edges too fuzzy, and there was a menacing blue glow where his left eye usually was.

“It looks like you’re having a bad time,” he said and his voice was hollow and flat.

 _Sans_ , you tried to say, but nothing came out of your mouth. Everything started to waver like a heat mirage and your head felt like it was going to split down the middle. You wound your fingers through your hair and sank down onto your knees, eyes clenched shut as a sudden wave of vertigo hit you.

There was an odd pull behind your navel and a pressure like someone had reached inside of you and was trying to yank out something important. There was a palpable frustration to the effort, though you didn’t know how you could tell. The tugging became so insistent that you whimpered. The shrieking laughter in your brain turned to growling, raging screams.

 _WhyWhyWhyWhyNoNoNoooo!_ Whatever it was yanked one final time, using all its might. It was such a shocking feeling that your eyes popped open.

The sky had turned into a black void and the streets of Snowdin were full of bodies, all of them quickly disintegrating into ashes and dust. You watched with mute horror, eyes darting around as you tried to make sense of what was happening. You caught sight of yourself in the windows of the library - it wasn't your reflection that looked back.

Movement snatched your attention away from dead eyes and a crooked smile. Sans was still standing there, his skeletal grin white and distinct, his eyes dark pits. A diagonal line split open across his torso from shoulder to hip with a horrific tearing noise and slowly started oozing blood.

“It’s a beautiful day, isn’t it?” he said, voice incongruously jovial, and then he, too, began turning to dust.

You didn't even realize you were screaming.

 _I’ll kill you!_ the voice screams back.

You rocketed upright in bed, heart hammering so hard against your ribs that, for a terrifying moment, you couldn't breathe. You trembled like a leaf and you were so cold that the hot spill of tears down your cheeks was jarring. You leaned over the side of the bed and dry heaved, wheezing and panting like you had smoker’s lungs and struggling to free yourself from the damp grip of the blankets. Your throat was raw and your mouth was dry.

You tumbled onto the floor, completely unable to control your quaking body and crawled to the window, using the windowsill to draw yourself up and forcing your eyes to focus beyond the glass. Snowdin was completely peaceful, its early risers up and about, opening up shop and getting ready for the day, completely oblivious to your meltdown.

You exhaled hard and shaky, teeth chattering, and rested your forehead against the windowpane. Now that the shock was wearing off and you were coming back to yourself, you found that your entire body hurt, limbs feeling like water and head pounding.

“That wasn’t just a nightmare,” you rasped aloud, finding some comfort in the sound of your own voice, ruined as it was.

You were no stranger to bad dreams, you were victim to them more often than you liked to be, but you knew for certain that that hadn’t been one. And that _voice_ , you knew you’d heard that voice before. And Sans... he had been frightening to see; a completely different person from the lazy goofball you'd seen so far.

You shook your head, the horror still too fresh in your mind for you to be able to properly think about it all. You needed to sort yourself out first. A scalding shower would probably help.

For certain, though… you were now completely positive that something was definitely not right down here in the Underground. You’d had your suspicions since seeing all those shoes and children’s toys in Toriel’s house, and then the bunny shopkeeper had unintentionally confirmed that other humans _had_ fallen down here.

But you haven't seen any children.

The face in the store window flashed across your memory and you shuddered. You were reluctant to call the thing you’d seen a child, though it had worn such a face. No child had such a cold smile or eyes that empty. Though it too stirred something in the recesses of your memory. You felt as if you've seen that face before. 

“Shower,” you reminded yourself, shaking the troublesome thoughts from your head for the moment. More in control of yourself, you stood on slightly unsteady legs and went into the bathroom.

The mystery of the Underground grew.


End file.
